The Best Way to Reheat Pizza: 5 Methods Compared and Ranked

What is the best way to reheat pizza? Five methods, ranked.

The best way to reheat pizza is a covered skillet over medium heat. Not the oven, which most people reach for, and not the microwave, which most people actually use. The skillet wins because it fixes the two things that go wrong with a leftover slice at the same time, and it does it in about five minutes with nothing to preheat

Here’s what every method has to deal with. A slice of pizza is really three foods stacked together: a bread base that wants to be crisp, a layer of cheese that wants to melt without turning to oil, and toppings that just need to warm up. Heat from below crisps the base. Heat from above melts the cheese. Steam softens everything. Get the balance wrong, and you end up with either a bendy, soggy slice or a dry one with cheese that’s gone hard and shiny.

The comparison below assumes a typical leftover: a thin to medium slice, refrigerated overnight in the box, reheated straight from the fridge until the cheese is fully melted and the center is hot. Each method is judged on the same three things: the base, the cheese, and the time it takes. Your oven and your pizza will vary a little. The order of finish won’t.

The results, ranked

1. Reheat pizza on the stove in a skillet: the winner

A skillet does the two things a slice needs, in the right order. The dry metal crisps the base first, and a lid traps just enough steam to melt the cheese before the bottom scorches. No preheat to wait for, and nothing to clean but the pan.

1. Put the cold slice in a dry skillet. Cast iron or stainless is best; nonstick works. No oil. The pizza brings its own.

2. Set the burner to medium and leave it alone for 3 minutes. Lift the slice with a spatula to check. The bottom should be golden and shouldn’t bend.

3. Add two or three drops of water to the empty part of the pan, away from the slice, and cover with a lid. Count to 60.

4. Lift the lid. The cheese should be glossy and melted. If it isn’t, cover it for another 30 seconds.

5. Slide it onto a plate and give it a minute. The base stays crisp as it rests.

The water is the step people skip, and it’s the step that matters. Three drops turn into a burst of steam that melts the cheese in under a minute, long before the bottom can burn. Pour in a tablespoon instead, and you’ve just steamed the base you spent three minutes crisping.

For thick slices like Sicilian or deep dish, drop the heat to medium-low and double the covered time. The base needs longer to warm through, and the extra steam doesn’t hurt a thick crust the way it does a thin one.

2. Reheat pizza in an air fryer: fastest good result

An air fryer is a small convection oven, and convection is what crisps a slice fast. Set it to 350°F, lay the slice flat in the basket without overlapping, and give it 3 minutes. Check it. Thin slices are done; thicker ones need one more minute. Don’t go hotter. At 400°F, the pepperoni edges burn before the center is warm, which is the most common complaint about air fryer pizza.

The limit is capacity. Most baskets take two slices flat, so reheating half a pizza means three rounds. It also dries the cheese a little more than the skillet does, because the fan pulls moisture off the top while the base crisps. Side by side, the difference between an air fryer slice and a skillet slice is mostly in the crust: the skillet gives you a lightly fried bottom, the air fryer a drier, crackery one.

3. Reheat pizza in the oven: best for a whole pie

If you’re reheating more than three or four slices, the oven is the only method that does them all at once. The trick is to put a baking steel or pizza stone in the oven before you turn it on, heat it to 400°F for a full 20 minutes, and lay the slices directly on the hot surface. Five minutes later, the bases are crisp, and the cheese is evenly melted. On a cold sheet pan, the same slices take 10 to 12 minutes, and the bases come out soft because the pan has to heat up before it can do anything for the crust.

No steel or stone? Put an empty, heavy sheet pan in the oven during the preheat, then slide the slices onto it once it’s hot. It isn’t as good as a steel, but it’s a long way ahead of a cold pan. The oven loses points only on time. That 20-minute preheat is longer than the other four methods combined.

4. Reheat pizza in a toaster oven: fine, with one change

A toaster oven is a weak conventional oven with its heating elements close to the food, so the top dries out before the base crisps. Two fixes help. Use the rack position closest to the bottom element, and put the slice on the bare rack rather than the tray so hot air reaches the base. At 375°F it took 7 minutes, and the result was a firm base and cheese that had started to dry at the edges. Perfectly edible, and miles better than the microwave, but it never got the crisp snap the top three had. If you have a toaster oven, set a small ovenproof dish of water on the floor of it. The bit of humidity keeps the cheese from drying out before the base is done.

5. Reheat pizza in the microwave: last, and here is why

The microwave heats water, and a slice of pizza has water in the sauce, the cheese and the crumb of the crust. Sixty seconds on high turns that water to steam inside the bread, which puffs the crust soft while it’s hot and then collapses it into something tough and chewy as it cools. The cheese melts and then tightens into rubber about two minutes after the beep. No setting fixes this. The problem is the microwave itself.

The glass-of-water trick, where you put a half-full mug of water in with the slice, helps a little. The water absorbs some of the energy so the slice heats more gently and the crust puffs less. It’s still the worst of the five. If the microwave is your only option, use 50 percent power for 90 seconds instead of full power for 45, and eat it right away. A 30-second finish in a hot dry skillet after the microwave rescues the base, and that’s a respectable shortcut when you’re in a hurry.

Which method for which pizza

The ranking above assumes a thin New York style slice, and thin slices are the most forgiving. Thick and loaded pizzas change the answer, mostly because the center takes longer to warm than the top takes to burn.

One safety note, because it comes up with every leftover question. Pizza with meat or cheese should go in the fridge within two hours of coming out of the oven and be eaten within three to four days. Reheat it to 165°F in the center, which every method above reaches except a careless microwave. Reheating a slice left out on the counter overnight won’t save it; the toxins some bacteria leave behind don’t break down with heat.

The short version

The best way to reheat pizza is in a dry skillet over medium heat for 3 minutes, then add a few drops of water and cover for 1 minute. It takes five minutes, needs no preheat, and a good slice comes out of it better than it went into the fridge. The air fryer is the pick when you’re in a hurry, the oven on a hot steel when you’re feeding a crowd, and the microwave only when you’ve truly run out of options and are willing to eat fast.

If you want exact temperatures and times for every method and every style, from a thin bar pie to a frozen deep dish, this full reheating guide goes further than this post, including how long leftover pizza is safe in the fridge. Next time there’s a box in the fridge, try the skillet. You won’t go back to the microwave.

About the author

Rick Kennerknecht is a Colorado-based publisher who writes about food, travel, and the small practical questions people search for at 11 pm. He has eaten more leftover pizza than he’d like to admit.